Pythagoreio & the south

Pythagoreion and the Heraion were inscribed together on the World Heritage List in 1992, and they are a single argument about what a sixth-century BC tyrant could build. Polycrates ruled from the harbour town now named after Pythagoras, who was born here, and commissioned three works that Herodotus called the greatest in the Greek world: a mole still under the modern harbour, the enormous temple of Hera, and the Tunnel of Eupalinos — a kilometre-long aqueduct driven through a mountain from both ends at once, which met in the middle. You can walk a long section of it. Of the temple, one column stands out of a hundred and fifty-five.

The town itself is the pretty one on Samos: a castle above the quay, tavernas along the water, and the archaeological museum a street back. The airport is ten minutes away, which is why most packages land you here.

For swimming, Pythagoreio has its own beach and Ireon has the quiet one beside the temple; Psili Ammos, facing Turkey across a strait less than two kilometres wide at its narrowest, is the sand everyone drives to.